Tasty Baghdad Restaurant — Restaurant in Gladstone

Authentic! Generous! Hospitable! Fresh! Tasty!

I visited Tasty Baghdad with my sister, who spent over 25 years in the Middle East. She has been looking for the best, authentic Mediterranean restaurant in Kansas City, and today we found it!!

The first impression of Tasty Baghdad was the mint lemonade I ordered, tangy-citrus with generous-but-not-overwhelming muddled mint, and I was in. I would return here just for the drink! ☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️

For our lunch, we started with mezze, a compilation of appetizers, including hummus, baba ghanoush, grape leaves, and fattoush salad. Let me start with the hummus. It was the creamiest, loveliest hummus I have had in Kansas City, dipped with beautifully slightly-charred flatbread. The baba ghanoush, (did you know this means “spoiled daddy?”) tasted smoky with a perfect balance of tahini, not lemony. The fattoush salad with small chunks of crunchy fried bread (yum) with delicate balance of mint, lemon oil and pomegranate molasses (debbas remane) made this dish a standout! I could’ve had this for the whole meal! We were delighted with our first bites, and the joy continued!

We ordered two main meals for three people to share and left with enough takeout to feed two another whole meal…. We ordered Quzi, (sounds like oo-zey), which was fall-off-the-bone lamb shank on a bed of saffron rice with fried vermicelli, peas and carrots. Scrumptious! A perfectly balanced dish.

The second was the Mixed Grill, which included chicken taouk, ground beef, and regular beef kebabs with a half grilled onion and tomato covered by a huge charred flatbread. We were awed by the garlic sauce, which is a creamy, subtle white sauce that you spoon onto the meats. I have tried to find a garlic sauce that resembles the sauce I have eaten many times in Lebanon, but was unsuccessful until now. My sister agreed that it tasted just like home in Lebanon! Lastly, the dessert, kaneffe, made with a soft white stringy melting cheese with a mild and not-too-sweet syrup over small crunchy noodles was the perfect ending to this new favorite meal.

Not only was this meal superb, the restaurant was tastefully decorated and a relaxed atmosphere. They had a lovely divan area (see photos) and beautiful art on the walls. The booths were roomy and comfortable. Very light Arabic music played from a video on the television above the counter and was not loud enough to be intrusive. The music was perfect!

The ladies who were working were friendly, warm, and sweet. We definitely look forward to seeing...

I'm always on the lookout for great local restaurants in my neighborhood. We have enough chain restaurants around. And even the local joints around are getting a bit repetitive. There are tons of Mexican, Chinese and pizza joints to choose from. We don't need any more of those. So when I became aware of a new Middle Eastern place, I was eager to give it a try. The location has been home to numerous food joints in years past. A bit off the beaten path, these mom and pops come and go unfortunately. I think the location makes it difficult to draw enough business to be successful. So a key to success I believe is to provide food good enough for news to spread from your customers. And maybe, a new variety for someone to try. Not another sandwich place or pizza joint (unless it's amazingly good at least). So someplace I can get Shawarma? Cous cous? Falafel? I was excited to give it a try. Always rooting for the little guy, I'm ever hopeful that these new openings could be the next great local joint I can frequent. So I decided to check it out today. They use Postmates, which I'm not familiar with.... so decided to just go in and eat. That way I could ask questions about their menu, get a feel for everything they offer and maybe try a variety of things. They're just up the street. Get there about 11:40 AM. Sign is lit 'OPEN', but door is locked.... Try calling the number from their website, no answer. Tried back several times. Last resort: sent a text message via Google..... And - update - as of 1:20 pm. I now know that they were unable to open today due to electrical issues they are working on.... So. Still hopeful. I'm giving 3 stars for now with a promise to update when I have a chance to eat. I'm encouraged that someone replied during an obviously challenging day for them. Still hopeful. More to follow.

First visit did not disappoint. Staff were very patient with all our questions. This is not the same as other mediterranean restaurants I've visited. Best lamb I believe I have ever tasted! Rice was super unique...

We try a new restaurant in the area every now and then on a Friday. So we chose Tasty Baghdad today. I saw great reviews and middle eastern cuisine I have not tried that much. We told waitress/host that we were trying this out and never had any of these cuisine she was so helpful with describing the meals and giving us ideas so we could try a lot of food. We had the sampler appetizer (large), eggplant salad, hummus, taboula and baba ghannouj. All so good probably could eat some without the bread. Then we got lentil soup daughter (15) loved it can't blame her since it was very good never had lentil soup, but might try it from now on. Then we had Iraqi mix grill meat smelled and tasted great, we shared, but we probably could have just eaten whole by myself. Then we had the lamb shank it came with rice and noodles, the noodles had a sweet cinnamon taste that was delicious. We also had beef shawarma, to be honest I got two bites since I was focusing on the lamb and noodles, but the shawarma was very good too. We also got a bean soup, which most I have seen are a brown soup color but this had a red soup base and I fell in love with it, was such a comfort food that I kept going back to it. They also had an okra stew that was tasty but after the bean soup it lost any standing with me. Everything came with a side of rice and it was as tasty as everything. Every dish had flavor that made me want to savor it and we did, there was so much that we had to take it home and don't get me wrong we are full and happy. The price for all that food was surprisingly low. They treated us like guests at their home and not customers. I had not seen any reviews older than maybe 6 months so before leaving I asked when they opened, it was during the pandemic so tough time but I am glad they are still around and we will go back and I hope others see this review and will help keep them going. The flavors I think will surprise you if you are not use to middle eastern cuisine. What I did have did not disappoint and I want to try more of what I did not get to...